Recap / The Simpsons S 2 E 15 Oh Brother Where Art Thou

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Oh Brother Where Art Thou is the 15th episode of the second season of The Simpsons.

After suffering a heart attack at the movie theater, Grampa realizes his mortality and lets Homer in on a dark family secret: Homer has a half-brother named Herb (the product of a one-night stand Grampa had with a dunk-tank carny-cum-prostitute) that he gave up for adoption before Grampa married Mona. When Homer finally finds Herb's whereabouts, the Simpsons are off to Detroit, where Herb recruits Homer to create a car for his company.

This episode contains examples of:

Are We There Yet?: Bart and Lisa annoy Homer with that question during the car ride to Detroit. Marge tells them they'll turn around if they don't stop, Homer complains that he wants to see his brother, an annoyed Marge tells him it was an idle threat.

Blatant Lies: When Herb disowns Homer at the end, Marge tries to comfort him by saying "I'm sure he said it to make conversation".

Bowdlerization: Bart singing the word "bastard" after justifying his use of it was edited out when shown on UK TV.

Bread, Eggs, Breaded Eggs: For their day out, Bart wants to go on a boat ride, and Lisa wants to go on a pony ride. Cut to Lisa riding a pony on Herb's yacht.

Brick Joke: Herb tells the family that his personal cook will make anything they want any time of day, leading Homer to ask hypothetical questions about making pork chops even at 4 a.m. After some family bonding scenes, we cut to Homer in the middle of the night and calling the cook.

Comically Missing the Point: The man in charge of the orphanage who Homer meets looks like Dr. Hibbert and tells Homer about his own lost twin brother. Homer fails to notice a connection. He also fails to get the enormous repeated hints at where his brother is and has to be directly told he is in Detroit.

After Homer told Herb that they're brothers, he's in shock. But Homer thought he lost the connection.

Cool Uncle: Herb consistently spoils his nephew and nieces. He'd even rather be called "Unky Herb" since "Uncle Herb" sounds so formal.

Downer Ending: Homer is left heartbroken after a bankrupt Herb disowns him. Some fans were so upset by Herb's downfall that the producers would ultimately do "Brother, Can You Spare Two Dimes" to give Herb a happy ending again (though a much later episode ["Changing of the Guardian"] reveals that Herb went broke again, and viewers don't get any information as to what happened).

It is quite possible that Herb's baby monitor idea was not that good of one.

Though the commentary also reveals the original ending had Herb coming up with another idea as the bus pulled away.

Epic Fail: Herb asks Homer to help his company design a car for the "average American man". Homer instead designs an $82,000Hummer Dinger that gets Herb laughed straight into bankruptcy. Herb didn't really made things easy on himself by 1) believing Homer, with his immense stupidity, actually could represent an "average American" and 2) Herb decided not to listen when the rest of the research team tried to warn him.

For context, we need to know that Herb only knew Homer for a short time. As a result, Herb doesn't know that Homer is an idiot and got where he is by being lucky in life.

Flashback: A quick one explaining how Abe had Herb. Quickly followed by Abe marrying Mona and the birth of Homer. Also, Mona makes Abe swore to never mention anything about Herb so Homer would grow up respecting his father, which Abe has forgotten about. (Incidentally, this is the first time Mona ever appeared.)

Foreshadowing: A cop who pulled them over was suddenly nice to Homer. Then, a guy in the bathroom is confused by his appearance. It turns out because Herb looks like Homer.

Gone Horribly Right: Desperate to save his company, Herb turned to Homer to design a car. He got a big, ridiculous, unwieldy machine whose production bankrupted him on the spot.

Hereditary Curse: Lisa observes that Herb was a big success, until he learned he was a Simpson.

I Have No Son: Or in Herb's case, "I Have No Brother" It took the next season for Herb to forgive Homer.

Insufferable Genius: Herb's design team. They might have been taken seriously if they hadn't been so pompous or explained everything in a demeaning, "we-know-what's-good-for-you" attitude, such telling Homer "Americans don't want [X]" whenever he asked for something. The lead designer quickly calling Herb to complain and (from the context) making personal insults towards Homer didn't help.

Irony: The Car Built for Homer, which was supposed to appeal to the average consumer, came with an absurdly high price tag.

Japan Takes Over the World: Powell Motors is losing ground to the Japanese. When Herb loses his fortune, his company is bought by a Japanese company.

Jerkass Has a Point: The design team makes some valid points about fuel efficiency and automobile designs, but how they express them ultimately demeans everything.

Loophole Abuse: Bart delights in being able to use the word "bastard" since that's technically the correct way to describe Herb.

Mean Boss: Herb is extremely dismissive and temperamental to his employees, viewing them as privileged idiots (in stark contrast to his own upbringing). This ends up being his own undoing, as he refuses to take their warnings of Homer's incompetence seriously, and forces them to continue with his doomed project until it's too late. They apparently know not to give what people want.

Never My Fault: Herb blames Homer for ruining his company despite putting him in charge, shelving all other projects and outright ignoring his employees' warnings, who despite being 'privileged idiots' as he put it still know enough about business to be on the board of a car company.

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